It all began one Sunday lunchtime with the family, discussing a planned holiday in Yorkshire, when the Pennine Way was briefly mentioned. Something stuck in my head and later that day in a quiet moment I started to research the Pennine Way, where did it start, where did it end and how long was the route in days and miles.
It started to really spark an interest, and then suddenly turned into the one thing that I really needed to do! After chatting to some friends over dinner about the Pennine Way, I discovered that one of my neighbours favourite books was ‘Pennine Walkies’, a book devoted to my new obsession. A book about a dog in a mid-life crisis, and his owner who decides that Boogie the dog needs to do some exercise..
A copy of the book duly arrived from Amazon a few days later and I eagerly dived in to the pages, keen to glean as much information as possible about this famous walk.
it didn’t take too many chapters before the reality of the Pennine Way and all that it holds was quite possibly, literally, a step too far.
Now let it be said that I like a walk; in fact I walked over 1000 miles in 2024, and the same the year before. I love the outdoors, being outdoors, the fresh air and the freedom. But walking the Pennine Way was going to be something else.
It’s a walk that covers 268 miles from Edale in Derbyshire to Kirk Yetholm in the Scottish Borders, crossing the Peak District, the Yorkshire Dales and Northumberland. It’s one heck of a walk and not for the faint-hearted, with a lot of the walk miles from civilisation and requiring a lot of wild camping. I think it soon dawned on me that this might not be such a good idea, and that finding something slightly less challenging, slightly shorter and nearer to home might be a better idea, something slightly less challenging to start with!
And so The South Downs Way hike was born…
